Premier Christy Clark says she's launched an internal investigation to confirm that no taxpayer dollars were improperly spent as part of a confidential BC Liberal multicultural strategy circulated last year by her own deputy chief of staff.NICK PROCAYLO
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BC Premier Christy Clark meets the public as over 200,000 people participate in the 12th annual Surrey Vaisakhi Parade, billed as the largest outside of India, in Surrey, BC., April 21, 2012. Clark says she's launched an internal investigation to confirm that no taxpayer dollars were improperly spent as part of a confidential BC Liberal multicultural strategy circulated last year by her own deputy chief of staff.NICK PROCAYLO
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VICTORIA — Deputy premier Rich Coleman vowed on Thursday to get answers about a confidential B.C. Liberal memo that explicitly called for government resources to be used for partisan purposes, saying he expects disciplinary action to be taken as quickly as today.

“This is just not acceptable. The language isn’t acceptable and there will be consequences,” Coleman said of the 17-page document, which was distributed in January 2012 by Premier Christy Clark’s deputy chief of staff.

“I think the consequences of bad behaviour can go all the way up to your termination and I think those issues are going to have to be dealt with very quickly,” he said Thursday afternoon, moments after apologizing multiple times in the legislature.

“I expect answers within the next 24 hours.”

Made public by the New Democratic Party during question period on Wednesday, the memo laid out a detailed and blunt strategy for how the B.C. Liberal government could use its taxpayer-funded resources to help the B.C. Liberal Party win over ethnic voters during the coming election.

On Thursday, Clark issued a written apology over the 2012 memo, saying she has asked her deputy minister to conduct an immediate investigation to ensure public resources were not misappropriated.

“It’s never ever appropriate to blur the lines in terms of using government resources between government and a political party,” Clark told The Vancouver Sun’s editorial board.

“What I’ve asked John Dyble to do, who’s my deputy in the civil service, is to go and investigate and ensure that no government resources were used to support that effort,” she continued.

Clark said she saw the memo for the first time this week, and was convinced after reading it that “none of the money that was talked about in that report was ever spent for the purposes that the people writing the document thought it might be.”

She added there was “no sharing of resources between government and the party.”

She said she launched the investigation, “to be absolutely sure of that, because it should never happen.”

The document — which was distributed between senior officials in Clark’s office as well as non-elected executive members of the B.C. Liberal caucus — spoke about “quick wins” such as official apologies for historical wrongs and creating an “ethnic database” that could be used by the party during the election campaign.

It is the second significant recent example of the B.C. Liberal government getting caught crossing the lines between the taxpayer-funded activities of the government and the partisan operations of the party.

Last November, B.C. Liberal caucus staff were caught using government computers and time to work on a party attack website against NDP leader Adrian Dix.

New Democratic Party house leader John Horgan said it was appropriate for Clark and her government to apologize, but said British Columbians deserve a more independent review of exactly what happened.

“The premier’s closest adviser, (deputy chief of staff) Kim Haakstad, has been working with her for almost 20 years. Surely to goodness if Ms. Haakstad is at the centre of this controversy she can’t be investigated by the deputy to the premier,” he said, calling the Dyble investigation a “quick fix.”

“This is not the time to try to push this under the rug. This is a profound breach of significant policies and statues,” he said.

Horgan also released more documentation Thursday, showing that last August the B.C. Liberal government approved a $100,000 program to hire community liaison consultants who could help with the partisan strategy.

Government officials said the program was stopped before the contracts were signed, and that a total of $7,000 was spent in good-faith payments to the four people who had been selected for the positions.

B.C. Liberal caucus members criticized the document that was circulated among senior members of their own government and party.

“There is a line and the document, in a number of instances, crosses that line,” said Finance Minister and house leader Mike de Jong.

“A blueprint using language of that sort, which in some instances is at best inappropriate and in other instances is proposing activities that would, if carried out, be entirely inappropriate. Yes, it’s troublesome.”

Minister of Social Development Moira Stilwell agreed: “I think everyone agrees it was wrong.”

MLA Kash Heed said he thinks the memo shows Clark has not set the proper example as premier.

“As a leader you need to deal with these significant issues. That’s part of your responsibility as a leader,” he said.

“When you’ve got a culture which appears to carry on with this activity, and you don’t deal with it in a significant and appropriate fashion, the behaviour will continue,” he added.

“People need to consider resignation and people need to be fired. That’s the only way you’re going to deal with this if you truly want to deal with it.”

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